


And There Was Only Darkness

by CaptainWeasley



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Angst, Character Study, F/M, Pining, Unhappy Ending, Unrequited Love (Kind of)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-21
Updated: 2020-04-21
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:29:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,326
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23761600
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CaptainWeasley/pseuds/CaptainWeasley
Summary: Rose loves the Doctor, there can be no question about that. But does he love her back? She can never be sure.
Relationships: Tenth Doctor/Rose Tyler
Comments: 2
Kudos: 7





	And There Was Only Darkness

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this while stuck at home alone during COVID-19. That is probably the reason why this story is so angsty... I'm sorry! I hope someone out there enjoys this nonetheless :)

Rose was unable to fall asleep. She was exhausted, and she knew that the next adventure wasn't far, she needed the rest, but her body simply wouldn't sleep. 

She turned again to lie on her other side, but it was no use. 

There was a sort of darkness that surrounded her at night, something she could block out easily during the day, something that was entirely forgotten when she was running for her life, when her hand was intertwined with the Doctor's, when all of space and time was just outside the TARDIS, waiting for her. 

At night... That was another story. At night, she was alone, and the darkness was right there with her. 

Rose hugged one of her pillows, her arms pressing into the fabric, her eyes shut tightly. 

_Shut up shut up shut up._

The darkness made her think things sometimes, horrible things she didn't want to think, and why couldn't she just sleep and wake up to a bright new dawn? 

The face of the Doctor was clear in her mind, his eyes, his smile, his voice, his hair, his hands—Rose slapped the pillow with one hand, trying to clear her head, trying to shut the voice out... 

_He's never gonna love you. Never, ever. He doesn't even care about you._

Rose knew that that last part was not true, at least, but the darkness was always very convincing when it made an argument. 

She forced herself to breathe evenly. Even if he didn't love her, that wasn't the end of the world, she reasoned with herself. People could fall in love multiple times. She would get over him and fall in love with somebody else. 

_No you won't. You think you'll be back on Earth someday, married to some normal human bloke? Is that really the life you want? Leaving the Doctor for some man?_

Rose pressed her face into the pillow, shook her head. It was hopeless. She would never leave the Doctor, that much was certain. Even if that meant spending the rest of her life in love with him, and him never looking at her twice... 

The first tear was silent, and the second as well, but then she was sobbing, loudly, pathetically. 

_You're gonna be alone forever, and he is never going to love you._

** 

The thing with the Doctor was that he was quite happy to touch Rose. He held her hand and he gave her hugs and he stood too close. Rose knew this, and she also knew that it was never more than that. Never would be more than that. 

And yet, when she touched herself, she imagined it was him: his hands on her body, his mouth on her own, the Doctor smiling at her, that beautiful smile. Rose had no trouble picturing it, she knew every inch of the Doctor's face, she _loved_ every inch of the Doctor's face... 

_Rose Tyler_ , said the imaginary Doctor, in that special tone he only used when saying her name, and Rose came with a moan. 

She curled in on herself afterwards, hugging her knees. Why was he doing this to her? Rose's whole body was shivering, why did her emotions hurt so bloody much? She bit her lip angrily. 

Life was unfair, she knew that, and she had to accept that as the reality, but that knowledge didn't lessen the pain in any way. Maybe this was just the price she had to pay: the universe had given her this wonderful life, and the Doctor as her friend, and all of that was amazing. And to balance it out, the universe had also given her this bloody pain, these terrible emotions, the longing... 

Rose wanted to be held by the Doctor, not because of mortal danger, but because he wanted to be close to her. She wanted him to dream of her, to desire her, to look at her and lose his bloody self-control, she wanted him to fuck her, to fuck her so hard she would scream, to fuck her so gently she would cry. 

She wanted the Doctor to love her the way she loved the Doctor. 

** 

One night, the darkness became too much. Rose fled to the library, where it was nice and cozy and she was sure to find a book that took her mind off things. 

The TARDIS lit up the corridor helpfully, not too bright, and then the library, too. There seemed to be one shelf in particular the ship wanted her to look at, and Rose followed the suggestion with a shrug. _Eep'nilgir's Magical Adventure_ seemed to be a long-running series from the 79th century, and Rose thought at first that it must be aimed at children, judging by the titles and the colourful covers. She pulled the first volume from the shelf ( _Eep'nilgir's Magical Adventure: The Curse of Ghirzo_ ) and settled down in one of the comfy armchairs. 

After reading a few chapters, Rose was pretty sure of two things: one, that this series was, indeed, not for children. Two, that she would not be able to stop reading any time soon. 

She did not keep an eye on the time. Well, for one thing, that was always difficult on board the TARDIS, because the ship was by definition outside the laws of time as Rose knew them, and for another, it really didn't matter as much as it did on any old planet. There was no sun that would rise here, no job to go to, no appointments at all. 

Rose was just picking up volume three ( _Eep'nilgir's Magical Adventure: Trapped in the Neverworld_ ) when she heard the Doctor enter the room. 

"Oh, there you are," he said happily, stepping around one of the shelves towards her. "Ready to go? There's something happening on Dzuar, that's the second moon of Dzeer—incidentally, the first moon is called Dzoor and the third moon is called Fhamour, and for a really funny reason, I'll tell you all about it on the way, are you coming?" 

Rose felt the words wash over her, she could listen to him for hours, she wanted to listen to him forever, she wanted—it had been a bad idea to forego sleep, Rose suddenly realised. Her emotions were closer to the surface than they usually were, and she felt like crying again. 

Not in front of the Doctor, not in front of the Doctor. 

It was easy to smile at him, it was always easy to smile when she saw him, even when she would rather cry. 

"I don't know if that's a good idea, I haven't slept at all since Rhigona. We can still go there later, right?" 

The Doctor's face fell visibly. 

"But Rose, it's been fourteen hours and twenty-seven minutes since we came back from Rhigona! You need to sleep." 

Was he worried about her? That wasn't something that happened often, and usually, there was a lot more mortal danger involved. 

"I know, I know. Couldn't sleep when we got back, and then I started reading these," Rose laughed, holding up her book. "They're really good." 

"Bestsellers for over fifty years," the Doctor informed her, "and written by four people, even though everybody thinks it was just three. Also a funny story. Well, maybe not that funny. Quite sad, actually. Anyway, I'm not taking you anywhere dangerous when you haven't slept in so long. Humans deal very poorly with sleep deprivation. Come on, off to bed with you, and then we're going to Dzuar when you're rested." 

He grinned at her, that stupid fucking grin, that grin that Rose loved more than anything else, and for a moment, she knew with absolute clarity that he was never going to love her. 

She wasn't sure whether she noticed her own tears first or the way his grin fell, not that it mattered much. Oh, she could slap herself for being so fucking weak, so bloody emotional. 

"Rose, what's wrong?" 

She shook her head, proudly, forcing herself to swallow her feelings down. 

"I'm fine, it's nothing. Just lacking sleep, that's all. Doing funny things to my eyes." 

She smiled at him again, she always smiled at him, every time she wanted to walk right up to him and shake him until he loved her she just smiled. 

Rose got up, book still clutched tightly in her hands. 

"Can I borrow this?" 

"'Course you can. Just put it back when you're finished. Promise me that before we go to Dzuar you'll actually sleep, though, and not stay up reading." 

The Doctor still looked worried, and Rose did her best to ignore his expression. 

"I promise, Doctor. Good night, then. See you in a few hours." 

"Good night, Rose." 

** 

Rose felt like her head was full of nails. Nails biting into her thoughts, their sharp points cutting into her mind, clattering whenever she thought of the Doctor. 

_Alone, alone, alone_. 

Her heart was swollen with love, so much she thought it must burst soon, so much it hurt. 

No one would ever touch her again. She only wanted the Doctor, and that was the one person she could never have. Everybody else paled in comparison, she couldn't picture herself with anybody else, not even in her fantasies. 

If he were a human, she would have shagged him ages ago, she was sure, no man had ever treated her like the Doctor treated her, like she was precious, like she was _glorious_. If a human man treated her like this day in and day out, well, it would be no problem at all to grin at him and lean up to him and kiss him. But this was the Doctor. He looked like a human, sure, but he was alien enough that Rose was unsure if his behaviour meant that to him, she was just a really good friend. Who knew how Time Lord friendships worked, anyway? 

And worse than that, she was terribly afraid of messing up their relationship. They were walking some kind of line, even though Rose wasn't sure where exactly the line even _was_ half the time, she was sure there was a line, and it was obvious that the Doctor didn't want to cross it. Rose could never bear it if she did something to drive the Doctor away. She had seen it often enough: unrequited love making friends become strangers, confessions that made people stop talking to each other. If that ever happened with the Doctor... 

No, Rose would rather walk the invisible line, would rather take everything she could get, every touch, every hug, every time he held her hand, every smile, every glance. She wasn't sure whether it was fear or selfishness that made her choose this, maybe a little bit of both. All Rose knew was that she would gladly endure the pain of being close to the Doctor if that meant she didn't have to lose him. 

He never said anything and neither did she. 

Not until that last fateful day, anyway. 

** 

"Rose Tyler, I—" 

The words haunted her. 

Not a day went by that she didn't think of them. 

Not a single morning without waking up sweating and panting, the Doctor's face clearly visible in her fading dreams. 

After a while, the Doctor of her nightmares seemed more real than the Doctor of her memories. The Doctor of her nightmares laughed at her when she confessed her love for him, the Doctor of her nightmares said, _Rose Tyler, I_ and made himself vanish so he didn't have to finish his sentence. The Doctor of her nightmares turned away from her to embrace somebody else, his next companion, faceless but beautiful, laughing smugly at Rose. _He is mine now,_ the nightmare companion said, _and he loves me more than he ever loved you._

_It's not true_ , Rose told herself firmly every morning, tears on her face, _it's just a stupid dream._

She made herself remember the Doctor as he had been: smiling at her, embracing her, his hand in hers... 

But she was only human, and human memories fade. 

** 

Rose couldn't say how exactly it happened, but one day she couldn't remember what it felt like to hold the Doctor's hand. It had slipped from her mind. 

It had been a good feeling, she knew that much, but how exactly had it felt? 

Soft, somehow, and cool, and safe. Yes. But the shape of his touch, the texture, those details Rose could not recall. 

Dread settled low in Rose's stomach. If she could forget this, she could forget... everything. 

She started writing her memories down, as detailed as she could. But how did one describe the details of a smile? Every smile was different, every moment unique, every emotion singular. Having no choice but to write _the Doctor smiled_ was almost worse than not being able to remember at all. Rose did remember much but her words had limits, so many bloody limits. 

How could she describe the feeling of being in his arms, chests pressed together, feeling his breathing and his heartbeats, how could she put this onto a page exactly so she would never forget? 

After weeks of trying her best to conserve her love, Rose had to admit that she simply couldn't, that she had no choice but to let some memories go. 

** 

Years later, she cried in the arms of another Doctor. 

She could not remember the Doctor's smile. Her half-human Doctor's smile had always been a bit different and rationally, she knew this, but she could not tell the difference any more. She could not remember what made their smiles distinct. For a while now, she had been unable to remember how the Doctor had looked at her on board the TARDIS, the sound of his voice, the feeling of his hand holding her own, the beating of his two hearts when he hugged her. 

The Doctor's smile was the final loss. 

And then, the Doctor was gone forever.


End file.
